


Carol of the Bells

by A_Diamond



Series: First Noel [2]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Adoption, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Christmas, Family, Fluff, M/M, Parenthood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-20
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-09-10 15:40:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8922850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Diamond/pseuds/A_Diamond
Summary: It’s another Christmas for the Pendragons; a much more harmonious Christmas than the last, now that the family has learned to get along. But the universe doesn’t seem inclined to let them have an uneventful gathering.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Merlin Carols](http://merlincarols.livejournal.com).
> 
> Though part of a series, this story can be read on its own.

Morgana arrived mid-morning on December 24th and promptly kicked Merlin out of the kitchen. Then she dragged him back in, but with strict orders to “only do exactly what I say and not anything that your disaster of an inner chef thinks you should be doing.”

It wasn’t entirely fair—Merlin’s cooking had actually improved over the past year of extensive effort—but that didn’t stop Arthur from laughing. Or being secretly grateful that Merlin wasn’t going to be in charge of dinner.

Uther got to the house a few hours later, looked at Merlin more or less running frantic circles around Morgana as he tried to simultaneously dice an onion, stir a pot, and sing along to some horrendously catchy Christmas pop song, and made the wise decision to call a greeting through the doorway and otherwise leave them to it, joining Arthur and Noel in the sitting room.

“Great-Aunt Agatha sends her regrets that she’s unable to join us,” Arthur told his father after Uther hugged him and kissed Noel. “Our house is so much further to travel than the family estate, and her health isn’t up to it.”

Uther looked at him in surprise. “You invited Great-Aunt Agatha?”

“No.”

“Ah.”

Merlin’s terrible singing aside, things were quite peaceable through dinner. But the universe seemed opposed to the idea of an uneventful Pendragon Christmas.

The birth of their first child had taken them surprise by its timing, two months premature and terrifying right up through the day the doctors said it was safe to take Noel home. The birth of their second child took them by surprise because they hadn’t planned on a second child just yet, so soon after Noel. A few years more, they’d decided.

Nevertheless, when Arthur and Merlin received an unexpected Christmas Eve call from the social worker who’d overseen Freya’s case and their son’s adoption, needing emergency placement on the holiday for a newborn whose mother wanted nothing to do with her—well, they couldn’t say no.

“Her name is Carol, she was just born this morning,” Alice said. “It only needs to be for a few days.”

“But—could it be for longer?” Merlin asked before they went in, his voice quiet like it got when he was trying not to be hopeful.

Arthur wrapped an arm around Merlin’s waist and squeezed soft reassurance. He knew that they were both likely to fall in love as soon as they saw her, and no amount of forewarning would prevent heartbreak if they had to give her back.

From Alice’s beaming smile, she’d expected no less.

The mother, Lamia, was suspicious of them from the very first, surprisingly protective of a child she adamantly refused responsibility for. Only after what felt like hours of fielding her interrogation had she allowed them to take the baby from the medical cot near her bed, when Carol started crying for attention.

This time Arthur was the first to hold her, inspiring a shriek and more wailing. She was larger than their son had been at birth, benefiting from an easy pregnancy which ended at its full term, but much smaller than he was at a day shy of one year old.

“She’s probably hungry,” Lamia said with unconvincing disinterest, continuing her strategy of caring about Carol without caring for her. Though Alice had only shared a small amount of Lamia’s history with them, it was enough that he understood why her relationship with the baby would be complicated at best. They wouldn’t press her for more. “The nurse can give her formula.”

Carol kept crying as a nurse came and went, then returned with a warm bottle of formula. Instead of handing her over to be fed, Arthur asked, “May I?”

He cradled her to his chest, coaxing the bottle’s nipple into her mouth until her sobs faded and she latched on. She fed fussily, turning away from the nipple every few moments to complain and dribble formula down his shirt. Warm against his back, Merlin wrapped his arms around Arthur’s waist and hooked his chin over Arthur’s shoulder, watching the little girl— _their_ little girl, she just had to be, he was already sure of it—sniffle and take the nipple again.

Patient and unashamedly melting each time her dark brown eyes blinked up at him, he got about a third of the formula, less some spillage, in her before she refused to return to the bottle. It was enough, and the liquid had grown tepid by then anyway. As Merlin took the bottle from him to put it down, Carol started to whimper again. Though softer than before, her wails lasted through a non-productive burping, a diaper check, and Arthur’s wordless—and perhaps, he could admit, tuneless—humming. The last actually seemed to make her more upset, so he stopped pretty quickly.

Then Merlin came around and started making utterly ridiculous faces, wiggling his ears and widening his eyes and contorting his mouth in ways that ought to have been the most unattractive grimaces Arthur had ever seen from him. Instead, such a burst of affection overwhelmed him that he very nearly swept Merlin into this arms to show his love. But he wasn’t willing to put Carol down, nor molest his husband in front of Lamia’s softening but still judgemental eyes. He settled for letting warmth wash through his chest as he watched Merlin’s antics slowly distract her from her cries.

Just as she was yawning and struggling to keep her eyes open, finally overcome by the warm meal, the door to the room opened to admit the rest of Arthur’s family. Morgana and Uther had stayed at the house with Noel, but apparently decided to follow them when it became clear that Arthur and Merlin weren’t coming back quickly. Their arrival startled Carol into more wails, which in turn set off Noel, so Morgana disappeared with him down the hallway, murmuring soothing nothings.

Uther watched from a distance, talking softly with Alice and Lamia as Merlin and Arthur got the baby settled again, rocking and cooing until her eyes drifted shut and didn’t reopen.

Blue eyes swimming with awe, Merlin tilted his face up to meet Arthur’s gaze and whispered, “Arthur.”

“I know,” he said, and, “Here.”

Passing her over to Merlin nearly broke his heart, but seeing them together reforged it into something new, stronger and blazing bright. The edges of the world went soft and dim, but Merlin, cuddling a sleeping Carol against the terrible Christmas jumper he’d worn just to annoy Arthur, was warm and vivid.

“You know,” Arthur said, needing to break the solemn moment or risk unmanly tears of sentimentality. He wasn’t going to cry before Uther did, and neither of them wanted to beat Merlin to it. “If we want to change her name, given the date, we could always call her—”

“So help me, if the next word out of your mouth is ‘Noelle,’ I’m leaving you and raising our children in some dodgy council estate or the boot of my car.”

Arthur looked up at Merlin, affronted, but couldn’t get a word in.

“Nonsense,” said Uther before Arthur had a chance to respond. Apparently done with Alice, who had disappeared, he stepped quietly over to join them. He stared at the bundle of sleeping babe in Merlin’s grasp, his face soft with emotion in a way that still caught Arthur by surprise sometimes, even though he’d been seeing it more and more over the past year. “The Pendragon estate has more than sufficient space for you three, and I already have my security team on site. They can easily keep Arthur away.”

“Hey!” Arthur protested—but not too loudly, lest he wake Carol. Or her mother, asleep and peaceful at last on the far side of the room.

Lamia looked achingly young at rest, nearly young enough for them to be adopting her instead of her child. In truth she was nearly twenty, but her youthful appearance and the circumstances reminded him so strongly of Freya that it was hard to remind himself that Lamia was an adult. A mistreated and vulnerable adult, but an adult just the same.

Carol stirred, sighing and wriggling herself closer to Merlin’s warmth, but didn’t wake.  Arthur smiled down at her and resisted the urge to stroke a finger over her soft, flushed cheek only because it had taken so long to get her calmed down and sleeping in the first place.

“Do you want to change her name?” Eyes still fixed on Carol, Merlin seemed torn between thoughtfulness and besottedness.

After a moment of consideration, Arthur shook his head. “I think it suits her. And the date, actually.”

Merlin stared at him with an expression of dawning horror. “Dear Lord,” said Merlin, “birthdays are going to be a disaster.”

“Awful,” Arthur agreed. “Two birthdays and two days of holiday, all overlapping.”

“We’ll just have to do all our celebration of Christmas on Boxing Day,” Merlin said. “Christmas Day is for Noel, and Christmas Eve for Carol. And they’ll each get their own party, separate cakes and everything, of course.”

“At least we have a few years before we have to worry about it.”

Morgana slipped into the room. Arthur went to take Noel from her, and though she pouted, she didn’t object. Arthur suspected it was only the two sleepers keeping her agreeable, since he and Merlin had had to all but wrestle their son back from her the couple of times she’d babysat for them. She was just as smitten with him as Merlin and Arthur were, as was Uther.

That was why, despite not being prepared for a new addition to the family, Arthur wasn’t worried about suddenly bringing Carol into their lives.

They were well off, financially; Arthur earned a substantial salary from his work for his father, enough that Merlin was able to stay home with Noel. Doubling their child-related expenses, or a bit more than that, would stretch but not break their budget. They’d be able to provide her with necessities, and her aunt and grandfather would undoubtedly spoil her with luxuries.

Equally important—more important, Merlin would say, raised by a single mother just above the poverty line—she would be surrounded by love. Arthur knew that he and Merlin on their own had more than enough affection to share that neither child would ever need to feel neglected. But they weren’t on their own.

Ignoring Arthur’s more distant and distantly related relatives, which they might as well do since none of them had sent more than a card with some bank notes for Noel’s birthday, the extended family wasn’t large. Merlin’s mother had passed shortly after they started seeing each other, and he had no other family. Lamia had no desire to be involved in Carol’s life, but Freya was likely to want to extend her role (which had thus far been more friendly cousin than doting aunt, because she was still _so young_ ) to her biological son’s adopted sister. Morgana was more than enough aunt to go around.

As Noel’s only grandparent, Uther was active enough to count for at least three. More active than he’d been in Arthur’s own childhood, but he wasn’t resentful. It was long ago, and they’d reconciled most of their past grievances since Noel’s birth.

Calm but not sleeping, Noel babbled a delighted, “Puh!” and slapped his hand on Arthur’s chest. Arthur snuggled his face into Noel’s belly, earning himself a giggle, then held him out so Merlin could press a kiss to his soft blond hair. Then Arthur leaned in to kiss Merlin himself, as distant church bells rang out midnight.


End file.
